• Kickoff Celebration

    "I Love to Read" with magician Cody Fisher

    After the show: refreshments, horseback rides, face painting and more!     Read More

  • Hands on Fun!

    Classes begin on Thursday, June 13th-July 25th for children 6 yrs. and up

    Online registration begins on May 15th.     Read More

  • Wacky Wednesdays

    Wacky Wednesday begins on June 12th @ 10:30am with folksinger, Steve Brooks,and continues every Wednesday until July 24th. Read More

  • Business of the Year

    Wimberley Village Library: voted Business of the Year for 2012!

    Thanks to all the businesses who voted for us and thanks to the Wimberley Community for attending our programs and for using our collection and services.

  • DONNA INGHAM

    TALL TALE TELLER

    Donna will entertain us on Wednesday May 29th 6pm

    Everyone is welcome!     Read More
› ‹
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

Search the Catalog

Librarian Blog

Text Size

One way to beat high costs

  • Print
Details
Category: Librarian Blog
Created on Wednesday, 15 May 2013 11:41
Written by Carroll Wilson

Perhaps you've never heard of OpenStax College.

I had not heard of it until I ran across an article today at a library website.

OpenStax College is a book publisher based at Rice University, and among other things, I guess, it publishes college textbooks.

It's making news because OpenStax has announced that it will double the number of online textbooks it publishes by 2015, thanks to a grant from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation.

The books are offered for FREE.

The grant will let OpenStax develop and post books in six subjects -- precalculus, chemistry, economics, U.S. history, psychology and statistics.

Ultimately, according to the article I read at Infodocket.com, OpenStax plans to offer books for 25 of the nation's most-attended college courses. The university estimates students would save $750 million over five years.

Wow.

What a great thing for a university to be doing. Instead of holding students and their parents under until they blubber (or quit), here's a university trying to help their constituents out by reducing their costs substantially.

As I have mentioned here previously, the text for a college course I taught at UT-Austin in the spring of 2012 cost north of $100. I didn't require students to buy it, and because of that I spent a lot more time and trouble developing materials.

Not complaining. But, a text would have been nice to get into their hands.

Some day soon it's to be hoped that colleges will let their students use these OpenStax books and save all that money.

Add comment

Security code
Refresh